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Daily industrial news and top headlines for plant and maintenance managers

Measuring the overall performance of your supply chain can be boiled down to a few key questions. Is the supply chain acquiring the things your organization needs? Is it providing customers with the things they need? And is it doing it all in the right time and for the right price?

For 31 years Wes Dean has been supporting production, maintenance, IT and warehouse operations – the majority of that time being spent in the Coors and MillerCoors family. Dean recently sat down to discuss a number of trends and challenges impacting maintenance and asset management for manufacturers.

Whether it’s adding a new process line, building an additional plant or expanding an existing facility, conducting a supply chain analysis in partnership with your design team can lead to better decision-making and more efficient capital expenditures.

Manufacturing.Net's Bridget Bergin had the chance to speak with Traci Fiatte, President of Randstad Staffing about the hot jobs in manufacturing, how aspiring workers can best fill these positions, how employers can best attract potential workers, and other trends in manufacturing training and hiring.

In 2008, General Motors conducted internal training for its engineers on how to document product risks, including bans of the words 'defect' and 'problem.' Well-intended or a shameful legal dodge, the training skirted around the problem instead of attacking it head-on.

Economic activity in the manufacturing sector expanded in January for the 20th consecutive month, and the overall economy grew for the 68th consecutive month, say the nation’s supply executives in the latest Manufacturing ISM Report On Business.

No matter what type of manufacturing business you run, you should always be looking for ways to make your operations safer. To start out the new year safely, take a look at a couple of the major causes of incidents in 2014 and see how these accidents could have been prevented.

It took just minutes for a flash fire near a bag dump station inside a New Jersey ink plant to set off an orange fireball that engulfed seven workers. Now, after releasing its report of the incident, the U.S. Chemical Safety Board is blaming outdated combustible dust regulations for contributing to the accident, and urging OSHA to respond with national rules.

Last fall, the British Royal Navy commissioned a powerful new high-tech frigate so silent that it would be able to sneak up on submarines undetected. The ship, called the Type 26 frigate, has been designated to become “the workhorse” of the British fleet.

When accurate, near real-time channel data is not abundantly available, sales and inventory fall one or two steps behind true customer demand. And there can be devastating results — including poor channel intelligence, delayed incentive payments or overpayments, and occasional massive write-offs caused by excess inventory stuck in the supply chain.

Sampath Kumar, Partner and Global Leader at ISG (Information Services Group) Engineering Services, spoke with IMPO about the important trends and growth within the Engineering Services Outsourcing Market.

Many industries, especially manufacturing, are discovering that business intelligence and more efficient use of large amounts of data help them become more agile and better equipped to respond to ever-changing markets. As a result, many companies have concluded that their legacy ERP systems are simply not up to the task, and these same companies are finding the ideal business solution in cloud-based ERP systems.

When people think of the supply chain, they think trucking and warehouse. On the front lines, they see a need to be physically strong. They see a male-centric role. We don’t necessary think women can do things in the supply chain. We need for people to think differently.